Arriving in Switerland!

We're here!! Our flights went smoothly, but with little sleep as usual. We had one stop in Dubai for three hours. Arriving on Zurich airport we had to wait a while for our luggage and then made our way to the train station. It took a while to figure out which tickets to buy and we missed our train with a few seconds! We had to wait for the next train which arrived an hour later. In the meantime Andre went in search of a sim card for his phone which he found at Swisscom. We later found out that this is one of the more expensive places to get a sim. The first of many expensive lessons we are learning! Anyway we had communication and internet :-)

We arrived at B & B Villa Felice, our home for the next month. It's very nice. We have a good room a lovely view of the forest. The house is up on a hill a bit out of town. Oh yes we had to take a bus from the train station here in Baden and then pull our heavy luggage up the hill! We'll have to make a different plan when the time comes to move out here... We also have our own bathroom (some B&B's you have to share) and the use of the balcony outside our room and the kitchen, a shelf in the fridge and the laundry room. So we're quite comfortable here for now!

Yesterday (Monday and public holiday) we walked into Baden to the train station instead of taking the bus. A nice walk, I think it took us about 25 min or so. When we got there I remembered that I wanted to bring along ID photo's which I had in the room so Andre could get his monthly train ticket and a discount year ticket for me (I can get 50% discount when I buy any public transport tickets). Anyway I forgot the photo's so I convinced Andre that we had to take the bus back to the B&B after we just walked all the way into town!

Took the train in to Zurich and walked south along the west side of Zurich See (a huge lake). It is absolutely beautiful!! There are beautiful parks, green with big trees, where people have picnics, braai, play badminton, frisbee or tan in the spring sun which was surprisingly hot. There are also little beaches (with sand!) where kids build sandcastles.

For lunch we each had Bratwürst in a baguette on the grass by the water. We carried on walking in the direction of Horgen where I have an interview at a school on Thursday. When our feet got too tired we sat by the water and watched some people and a labrador swimming in what must have been very cold water! At Kilchberg we got onto the train and rode the rest of the way to Horgen. Found the school, then went to buy tickets to go back to Zurich by boat.

The boat to Zurich was scheduled to arrive at 15:15. At 15:11 a boat arrives and we decide it must be a little early and will probably wait a few minutes and then leave at 15:15. So we get on and the boat doesn't waste any time departing again. In the wrong direction! The 'conductor' (what do you call the person who checks tickets on a boat?) checks our tickets and tells us we are on the wrong boat! Argh! We got off at the next stop, had to climb a hill and then down the steps on the other side to the train station to get a supplement ticket since we now traveled to another zone. Then back up what felt like a hundred steps (see photo's on facebook) and back down the hill on the other side to wait for the next boat. It actually said Zurich on the boat. Now we know! 

We sat outside on the boat and the guy next to Andre started talking to us in very broken English. He had already had a couple of beers and was very funny! He kindly told Andre that he paid WAY too much for our drinks on the boat. You would expect it to be more but I'm not even going to tell how much more it was! Well we didn't know. He showed us his packet with beers bought at the supermarket... One of Andre's favourite German sentences are "Das ist güt!" This guy's favourite sentence was also (in English) "That is good!" He said it all the time and we had a good laugh at him. He told us that he was in trouble with his wife because he has to go barbeque and is late!

So that was our day yesterday. It really felt like holiday; a warm evening when we got off the boat in Zurich with people out everywhere along the water.

Today I walked into Baden again and managed to open a bank account. It was surprisingly quick and easy. A young guy who looked a bit like Owen Wilson patiently helped me in his best English. In a couple of days I will get my card and account details in the post.

Ok, that's more than enough blogging for one day! I'm going to put pictures on facebook now so go have a look there if you haven't yet.

xx 

Earth Hour Braai

On the 28th of March it was Earth Hour. I hope you switched your lights off during that time! We did and here's what happened!

Earth Hour Braai from Anneliese Mostert on Vimeo.

Biddulphs comes to pick up our boxes

I roughly estimated that we might have 10 boxes to ship over to Switzerland and got a quote for the 10 boxes from a couple of different companies. Biddulphs turned out to offer the best price.

After finishing the packing on Thursday we had 8 full boxes and the 9th one with only the two motorbike helmets in. I was impressed that we managed to stay under the estimated 10. At times I thought we were going to have more like 15 boxes. So Sunday evening I filled the 9th box with some more odds and ends. 

They would be collecting on Monday. Oh by the way- note that they said they'd come Monday late afternoon and would phone before arriving.

So Monday morning after going to the consulate to hand in Andre's passport for his visa and sorting out bank stuff we're just sitting around at his house when he decides maybe we should pack another box... So we're sitting thinking what could we put into this 10th box and actually coming up with a couple of stuff when the doorbell rings. Andre says it's Biddulphs and I say don't talk nonsense they're only coming later and anyway they haven't phoned yet.

But yes, it was Biddulphs arriving unannounced at 12:55.

Now we had some stuff in mind that we actually decided would be a good idea to also take with in this not yet existing 10th box. So off I rush to my house to fetch the things we decided to pack as well as a few other souvenirs along the way. Throw it into the car and rush back to pack this 10th box. Biddulphs was patiently waiting for us to finish this rush. Well they better had been waiting because I made them understand that they were way early. They did appologise and were actually very good about everything. 

The 10th box got taped up and off goes all our things. They said it would be in Zurich in about a month which is great. I expected it to take longer.

Now all we have to do is pack our bags. Hope it all fits!

Packing continued...

I've been sooo nervous about not getting this visa in time. We just got an email saying that it was all a mistake, I never needed to get this visa! What a relief! So  will be traveling with Andre next Saturday! Now we're busy booking accommodation. We found a B&B in what sounds to be a nice town. A bit out of Zurich but it sounds good. Just hope they still have the room available after all the uncertainty with the visa... We didn't have much choice of accommodation. Close to Zurich gets really expensive, close to the office was all full and it seemed that a furnished apartment for only a month or two would also be more expensive and not that many available.

So anyway, Andre sorted out his cupboards last weekend. He's got loads of cupboard space so had loads to sort out. I lied on the bed saying "out" for just about everything coming out of his cupboard. He ended up having a 'recycling' box and a 'For Sale' box. He's opened his own Sport Shop in the lounge selling something for any sport you can think of. We took pictures of everything and 

emailed a list and also put it on gumtree. 

On Monday our boxes for shipping will be collected. One day earlier than planned. I keep on finding MORE stuff that needs to go with... I packed my duvet this afternoon. Wanted to see if it will fit in a suitcase. Juergen is coming to visit over Easter and is bringing an extra suitcase so I'm thinking of sending my duvet with him. 

Ergh I just remembered I still have to phone Discovery health. I've been struggling to get my claims through to them for so long. Have to check that they got it this time. 

One more stumbling block

I just realized I never let you know here when we're leaving.. We booked tickets to Zurich leaving here the 11 April. Today Andre phoned the embassy to see how my long stay visa is coming along and we got another little surprise: It could take 8-12 weeks :-( And it's only been 2 weeks now. We're going to see what we can do. The very nice embassy lady said my visa shouldn't be a problem, it was Andre's permit that was the difficult one. So maybe we will be lucky and still get it in time. Otherwise we will try and find a way around it. I really don't want to only fly out later. Then I will have to change my interview too and I don't want to do that...

Langebaan

We had a wonderful weekend in Langebaan. A very relaxing camping weekend with the most perfect weather.

Langebaan 13 -15 March 2009 from Anneliese Mostert on Vimeo.

Packing

I started packing today!

We're using Biddulphs to ship some boxes over to Zurich so I went to pick up empty boxes, bubble wrap and tissue paper from them. Today I started unpacking my classroom boxes which I packed when moving out of my classroom end of last year. I need to minimize those boxes quite a bit... I changed Andre's lounge into a colourful classroom! 

After unpacking just about everything I decided I first need to sort out my files. No space to do that in the lounge with half a classroom all over the floor, so I moved all my files to Andre's room. It took me just about all day but now I have super organised files!

(Andre's lounge is still looking exactly as it is on the picture above.) Packing to be continued tomorrow...